Drowned Hopes Page 6

  She turned to Sam, getting angry all over again. "They won’t let me deposit it," she said. "And they won’t even let me cash it. Not without waiting ten days for the check to clear, that is."

  Ellen shook her head in disgust. "As if I had ten days worth of living expenses stashed away somewhere."

  Sam said, "Let me guess – credit problems?"

  Ellen gave a bitter laugh. "You’d better believe it," she said. "I don’t know what’s happening, but somehow from one day to the next my credit rating’s gone to hell. I mean, I always pay my bills on time. Somehow, and some way, I manage. My father taught that your credit rating was next to a government security clearance in importance. So, I’ve always been careful."

  She laughed, ruefully. "Probably the only thing my father said that I ever paid attention to. But then it all went away – poof! And I’m magically tainted."

  Ellen sighed. "It’s like somebody’s stalking me on a computer," she said. Then it suddenly occurred to her. She slapped the dashboard with an open hand. "Harry." she exclaimed. Another slap on the dashboard. "What a bastard."

  "Harry’s your brother?" Sam said.

  Ellen was astonished. "You’re good," she said. "How’d you guess that?"

  "I got to be a pretty decent judge of human nature in prison," Sam said. "And you did mention his name."

  Ellen nodded. "That’s right," she said. "You’re studying to be a psychologist."

  Sam shrugged. "Never mind that just now," he said. "What about the check? How are you gonna get your money? You have to live, right?"

  Ellen slumped back in the seat. Tears welled up. God knows," she said. "Everything seems so… so against me lately. Damn it. I actually know what feeling overwhelmed really means, now. Before it was just a mood description in one of those Jane Austen rip-offs they’re pushing these days."

  Sam had never read Jane Austen. But he’d read about her in a quickie lit survey course in prison – the kind that impressed hell out of female members of the parole board. Ellen’s comment about what he guessed were literary rip-offs was a little obscure, but he intuitively knew what she was talking about. A con is a con in any game. So he could give Ellen a sincere nod of understanding with the light in his eyes of knowing who Jane Austen was.

  And in his most soothing manner, Sam said, "It just feels that way because you’re new to town and haven’t made any real friends yet. Somebody to argue with you – take the opposite view. Then put it together again. Yin and Yang, you know? Like Jane Austen.

  "Although, I’m probably reaching there. Getting way over my head and making myself a fool. Because the only thing of Miss Austen’s I got through was a beat up copy of ‘Pride And Prejudice’ in the prison library. But it seemed like her point, you know what I mean? Yin and Yang? Opposites that show what it’s all about so you can put things together again?" Sam laughed in a self-depreciating manner. "Of course, I was reading some Zen stuff then too, so I probably got it all mixed up with Miss Austen."

  Ellen wiped her eyes. She was not the crying sort and didn’t like giving way like that. She was also mightily impressed. Of course, he had a pretty weird view of Jane Austen. But it was damned impressive that a macho sort – let’s face it, Ellen, a lower class sort - even knew who Jane Austen was, much less having read her most important book.

  "I guess…" she said, feeling it was a pretty weak reply to a guy who had just been reeling out handmade theories about the literature of Jane Austen.

  Sam’s eyes widened – and he reacted as if a thought of great brilliance had just hit him. He slapped the dash, much like Ellen had, but with his strength it was with greater force and made her jump.

  "Hey, I know," Sam said. "My buddy Danny manages one of those check cashing joints. And boy, does he owe me big time."

  He glanced over at Ellen. "Maybe he can help."

  Ellen looked doubtful. "I don’t know," she said. "It’s a pretty big check. And a private party one at that."

  "All Danny can do is say no," Sam said.

  He flashed a wolfish grin. "And Sam Barr is not a guy you can say no to lightly."

  *****

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ELLEN WAS INTRODUCED to the poor man’s banking system in a formidable place on the south-western most edge of Deercreek Beach.

  The building was long and squat and made of stacked concrete blocks, topped with a flat tar roof, which had a squalling antique air-conditioning unit jutting out of it.

  Since the business was arguably in an unincorporated area, jurisdiction was questionable and the only cops who ever stopped by were those who were down on their divorce luck and trying to cash checks before the audit board clipped them for child support.

  Ellen found herself standing in one of several very long lines of people of various nationalities, dress and sanitary habits. Sam stood guard beside her, looking over the crowd.

  The place was loud, hot and very democratic. At the head of each line people were yelling at cashiers in fenced-over cages. And the cashiers were yelling back.

  Eventually, money was exchanged for paper and the customer went away semi-satisfied and the line moved up a notch.

  "Might be a bit," Sam said.

  "Okay by me," Ellen said. "At least they’re getting the job done."

  Then she looked up at the big signs on the wall, where the rates were posted for cashing checks. Sam saw her visibly pale.

  "Oh, my God," she said, "this is usury."

  "But perfectly legal," Sam said.

  "I won’t have anything left," Ellen said. "Not enough to live on, anyway."

  "Welcome to the Poor Man’s First National Bank," Sam said. "After your boss screws you, we get in a poke of our own." Then he grew serious. "Don’t worry about it, Ellen," he said. "Remember what I told you – Danny owes me."

  Ellen lowered her voice. "But the check’s for four thousand dollars, Sam," she said. She indicated one of the offending signs. "That’s a five hundred dollar commission he’d be giving up."

  Sam gave her a quizzical look, that she couldn’t read. "How long is that supposed to last you?" he asked.

  "Three months," Ellen said. "I’m supposed to get eight thousand every quarter, but that’ll never happen as long as Harry’s got his hand on the till. So four thousand it is."

  "Leave it to me," Sam said. "You just hold on. I’ll be back."

  *****

  Sam headed for the center cashier window, pushing through and passing by the lined up people.

  Several of them objected to him butting in, but Sam only had to give them a look with those flat convict eyes of his and the objections died.

  When he reached his goal Sam elbowed his way in front of a bored clerk – Laura, her nametag said – who was getting ready to cash out the first guy in line. The man bristled, blowing himself up. He was already a pretty big guy and was practiced in the poor man’s art of making himself appear bigger.

  "I need to get in here, Big Guy," Sam said diminishing him by recognizing his game.

  Then to Laura, he said, "Get Danny for me."

  Big Guy became righteously angry. He’d been waiting for a fuck of a long time. He inflated himself even more, eyes bugging with the effort.

  "Hey," he said. "The hell you doin’?"

  And the sucker reached out to push Sam away.

  Sam just smiled and grabbed the Big Guy’s hand. He pulled it below counter level and squeezed – very, very hard. Like he was cracking Christmas walnuts.

  Big Guy’s face became stricken. "Jesus," he said. "Stop. Stop."

  Sam stopped.

  Without another word, Big Guy moved back several places in line.

  Sam returned his attention to Laura, who was staring at him in awe. He snapped his fingers and she jumped. "Danny. Remember?" he said. "Tell him Sam’s waiting."

  "Sure, Sam, right away," Laura said. And she hustled off to find Danny.

  Sam turned to face the line next to him – which was between him and the big iron door that led into the ma
in offices.

  He pointed at the first guy in line, who had seen everything that had gone on and gulped. "Coming through," Sam said.

  The guy jumped out of the way. As did several other people, shrinking up like cheap woolen sweaters in a hot Laundromat drier.

  Sam strolled easily to the iron door, the lines parting like the Red Sea before Moses.

  *****

  At the far end of the room, Ellen watched Sam’s progress, frowning, wondering how he did it.

  People moved out of his way with no argument that she could see. Sure, he was big and tough-looking – but he didn’t seem to be threatening anyone. What was this magic that Sam Barr had that made people do what he asked?

  At the cashier’s window she caught some kind of an exchange between Sam and the first man in line, but then people got in the way and she couldn’t make out what happened next. Apparently everybody here was a friend of Sam’s and let him get his business done without trouble. A lot of people besides this Danny person must owe him favors.

  Witness the fact that Sam was now going to the big iron door, which had security signs and warnings all around it, and the door was opening up despite the posted rules forbidding such a thing.

  She saw a hard-looking young man in a grubby white shirt and dirty tie talking to Sam, his brow furrowed in worry.

  Sam’s friend, Danny, no doubt.

  Danny nodded at whatever Sam was saying, but then, at the last instant, shook his head negatively. A few seconds later Danny firmly closed the door.

  Ellen’s spirits fell. People – even friends – have a way of disappointing you.

  Sam made his leisurely way back through the crowd.

  "I knew it," Ellen said when he’d returned, "Too much money to take a chance on, right?"

  Sam chuckled. "You’ve gotta have more faith in your new friends, Ellen," he said. "Danny will cash it, no problem."

  Ellen’s face lit up. What a relief. She started to dig the check out of her purse. "Oh, my God," she said. "You’re a miracle worker, Sam."

  "Hang on," Sam admonished. "There’s only one little catch. A hurdle we have to clear."

  Ellen raised an eyebrow. "You mean, he’s going to charge me five hundred dollars after all?" she said. "Well, at this point, I’m so grateful to just-"

  Sam jumped in, cutting her off. "Wait up, Ellen," he said. "You’ve got to let a guy finish. It isn’t going to cost any five hundred dollars. Fifty, maybe. Seventy five at the most."

  He paused for effect, then said, "The thing is, he needs an hour to clear the check through his own sources, know what I mean?"

  Ellen shook her head. "No, I don’t."

  "You have to trust him to hold the check," Sam said. "For about an hour, hour and a half. No more."

  Ellen became very hesitant. "I don’t know…" she started to say.

  Sam nodded, quite firmly. "You’re right to be suspicious," he said. "Hell, there’s about a dozen con games that are spun on this very same situation."

  He let that sink in then added, "But Danny isn’t conning us."

  "Still…" Ellen said, reluctant.

  "Okay, tell you what," Sam said. "If Danny screws around I promise that I will personally bust down that door and beat him to within an inch of his life."

  Then, most disarmingly, he gave her the most charming, boyish smile she’d seen in her life. "How’s that for a guarantee?" he said.

  There was a long uncomfortable pause as Ellen considered. She remembered the would-be-rapist and Sam’s knife at the guy’s throat.

  If she hadn’t protested…

  Sam shrugged, as if a negative decision had already been made. "No problem," he said. "I understand. I can drive you around to some more banks if you like."

  And now he added just a touch of emphasis: "I’ve got plenty of time this afternoon."

  That’s what decided it for Ellen. Reluctantly, she handed Sam the check.

  Sam said, "That’s fine, Ellen. But you have to endorse it."

  And he turned around and offered his broad back as a desk. Ellen smiled, fished out a pen and put the check on his proffered back. She scribbled her signature.

  Sam laughed.

  "Does it tickle?" Ellen said, teasing.

  "Oh, yeah, Ellen," Sam said. "It tickles like hell."

  "Wish it were ten thousand dollars," Ellen said. "Or even an hundred thousand. Can you imagine how much that would tickle."

  "I certainly could, Ellen," Sam said with a laugh. "I certainly could."

  *****

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  WHILE THEY WAITED for Danny to come through, Sam treated Ellen to a little mini-tour of the area.

  He drove past what he called the "Butterfly Ranch," where a person could stroll among tens of thousands – maybe even hundreds of thousands - of exotic butterflies flitting around in an enormous enclosed garden filled with jungle plants. A rare passion flower had bloomed there recently, he said. One that hadn’t been seen in over a hundred years.

  Sam promised to take her and Ruth there in the near future. "Maybe get Ruthie to pack a picnic," he said.

  Then he showed her the Gumbo Limbo Museum, where the sea turtle volunteers gathered. Sam stopped long enough for Ellen to grab some printed material and buy a jar of local honey.

  Again, Sam said he’d take Ellen and Ruth there at a later date. He seemed quite knowledgeable about the place. He told Ellen there were canoe trips of the Everglades that could be arranged at the center.

  "You should see me in a canoe, Ellen," Sam said, going for his boyish, smiley charm. "I can churn up the water like nobody’s business." Then he chuckled. "Of course, everybody wants to go slow to see the nature sights… Not get splashed by me," he said. "But I’m a little hyper, you know?"

  Ellen laughed. Sure, she knew. Sam was starting to seem more like a normal guy to her. He was just a big hyper kid from a bad background who had rushed off in the wrong direction because it seemed too exciting to resist.

  Finally, Sam introduced Ellen to a little place called Paradise Cove, which sat between Boca Raton and Deercreek Beach. It was a small marina, with shops and eateries on one side and professional fishing boats and short-cruise boats berthed at the docks.

  To Ellen, Paradise Cove was an Old Florida place, struggling to maintain its presence between the pressures of big city Miami, and burgeoning super class of Palm Beach. Ellen found the shops and restaurants to be middle-class tourist – but the fishing boats for charter at the docks were the real thing, as were the men and women who ran them.

  She promised herself that she’d come back and talk to them. Her years in the Caribbean had made her particularly sensitive to people who made their living from the sea.

  Inspiration peeped out from every corner of the waterfront and Ellen determined right there and then to return someday and make good use of it. But she didn’t tell Sam any of this while they strolled through Paradise Cove proper, perusing the boutiques and art shops.

  To her surprise, some of the shops were amazingly good. They were places that gave Ellen new hope for setting up business for herself one day in a gallery she could afford and where knowledgeable customers might find her – drawn by the ambience of the area, not expensive advertising.

  She even stopped to write down the number of a real estate agent, whose sign claimed to have rentals available in the center.

  "You don’t want that guy," Sam advised. "Ruth knows him. Says he charges a nonrefundable fee, then it turns out the only places he has listed aren’t fit for business."

  Ellen tore up the scrap of paper. She said, a little ruefully, "I’m getting quite an education today. A regular crash course in the school of hard knocks."

  "It’s not so hard from my point of view," Sam said. "Of course, like the man said, I’ve been down so long everything looks up to me."

  He glanced at her. "But then I wasn’t brought up rich," he said rather pointedly.

  Ellen didn’t take offense. "We weren’t rich," she said, with the a
ssurance of the class that knows what true wealth consists of. But we were certainly well off."

  "What happened?" Sam asked, asking the question that jumped years.

  "I fell in love with an inappropriate person," Ellen said. "And I was declared unclean by my entire family. They thought I was crazy. I guess, maybe I was. I left my husband. A very important, very rich New York investment broker. My father and brother considered it a personal betrayal."

  She hunched her shoulders and ducked her head down as she walked, determined to get the rest out. For herself – not Sam.

  "So they ganged up on me," she said. "Had me declared insane and put in an asylum. I lost my gallery. All my paintings. My reputation. My… everything."

  Sam watched her with great interest as she spoke, taking note not just of what she said, but of her body language, mannerisms – the way she held herself. She was a woman, he thought, very near collapse. Which for his purposes, made her the perfect mark.

  Ellen said, "Then my father died, which is how I got out of the asylum." Bitter laughter. "He – and only he – had the legal authority to keep me there. I was actually happy when he died. A terrible thing for a daughter to say about her own father."

  "I know all about screwed up fathers," Sam said, "so don’t feel entirely like the Lone Ranger. The main thing is that you got your freedom."

  Ellen nodded. "I got my freedom," she said. "And I flew off to Jamaica to be with my knight in shining armor. I got another gallery going. It was quite successful until my knight’s armor developed a bad case of rust."

  She gave another bitter laugh. "Anyway, I’m not sure who left whom," she said. "But the upshot was that when Andre and I split up, the authorities descended on me and…"

  Her voice trailed off. This was not a place she wanted to visit again. She shook her head, as if the thoughts could be scattered away like water drops.

  "I get the picture," Sam said.

  He waited a moment, then asked – "So you live off, what, your trust fund?"